<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Little Shreds of Moonlight by peachmeowzipan</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27510217">Little Shreds of Moonlight</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachmeowzipan/pseuds/peachmeowzipan'>peachmeowzipan</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Chrysanthemums and Bubble Gum [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Undertale (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Hurt/Comfort, Other, Reader is not Frisk or Chara, brief drug mention, everyone is depressed, gender neutral reader</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-08 03:55:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,497</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27510217</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachmeowzipan/pseuds/peachmeowzipan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>You pictured him in the storm for a moment, holding a joint but not lighting it as he stared up at the raging sky until he was soaked through, and then some.</p><p>He stood outlined in the black shadows of the hall now, eye lights glowing like little purple embers in oblong sockets.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Papyrus (Undertale)/Reader</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Chrysanthemums and Bubble Gum [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1828087</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Little Shreds of Moonlight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>this stuck with me for two days, so i sat down the other night and wrote it out.<br/>thanks for reading!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Hey,” a soft voice spoke up from the doorway, and you turned your head to look. Papyrus stood there, drenched from head to toe, his hood pulled up and water dripping from the faux fur it was trimmed with. “You wanna go outside?”</p><p>You had been listening to the storm for the better part of the evening and into the night, just sitting alone in your room as it grew gradually darker while rain pattered down outside in fat, fast drops, thunder rumbling in the distance as if Mt. Ebott itself were displeased about something. The only light came from whatever could bleed in through the thin sheet that was folded in half and tacked up over your window with push pins in lieu of an actual set of curtains. The blinds had been broken for years, and the cat who broke them is gone now, sleeping forever in some beautiful glade of green grass. But the blinds will always be mangled and broken, as if in memory.</p><p>The light behind the sheet was enough for you to see the shadows of the water as it collected into droplets that were too big to remain sitting on the window, dripped down in long streaks and disappearing to nowhere. That's what you'd been watching while you listened, leaned up against some pillows as you sat in silence and pretended not to exist. Your voice was scratchy from disuse when you finally opened your mouth to speak.</p><p>“You're soaked,” is what you said, and Papyrus' teeth quirked up into one of those lovely smiles. It couldn't reach you right now, as if he were miles away instead of a mere few feet, or a stranger. His purple eye lights shifted focus to the hard wood beneath his feet, where a growing puddle was collecting around them, reflecting no meager light from the window, but instead opening a small hole in the ground, a darkened area that looked like a shadow underneath him.</p><p>“Nyeh heh, yeah,” he murmured, and you realized that you'd been speaking quietly too, as if the both of you were occupying a liminal space, where loudness and laughter were not allowed– except for in little, secret doses, like this. His gaze flickered back to you, and you also realized that he must have warped directly to the dark doorway of your room from wherever he'd been standing outside. You pictured him in the storm for a moment, holding a joint but not lighting it as he stared up at the raging sky until he was soaked through, and then some.</p><p>He stood outlined in the black shadows of the hall now, eye lights glowing like little purple embers in oblong sockets.</p><p>Papyrus crossed the room to you, tracking water over the floor and then sitting on your bed, of all things. Water immediately began to soak into the bedspread and blankets, blooming across in darkened splotches. You didn't care very much, even though you stared hard at where his sopping wet body was seated next to you. It was only water. It would dry.</p><p>“C'mon,” he went on quietly, and you looked away, not back at the window you'd been watching through the sheet, but at the shadows next to your bed, at the ones that folded into your blankets and pillows. “I wanna be outside... would like it if you were with me.”</p><p>“You're soaked,” you rasped again, more quietly, and he huffed out another chuckle.</p><p>“Yeah, an' you could be too, if you joined me,” he said, as if sharing some very appealing fact. You imagined his gaze were twinkling, “Now's your chance!” There was a beat of silence. He shifted, and you tucked your head down further, stared at the blankets instead of answering him.</p><p>He half-lifted his hand then, you saw in your peripheral vision, rising blurry from his side and hovering there in the air. Then, he made a frustrated sound and lowered it, and you blinked your focus away, let your eyelids list until they were almost closed. The rain poured on outside, a calming white noise to float you through the moments, a buffer that you could listen to while the shadows ate away at your thoughts.</p><p>“Hey,” his voice drifted to you, a little bottle that nudged up onto the sand of the shore like a cautious animal, like a hermit crab who was scared to peek out of its shell. His fingers, hard and sharp, gloved and harmless, brushed against your cheek, and you closed your eyes instinctively, let him reach down to your chin and gently coax you to look at him. “I–”</p><p>He hesitated again, and you peered up at him, your own expression creasing with worry. He ground his teeth as he watched you, a flush darkening the stark white of his bones. His sockets listed, drooped down as he seemed to hunt for the right words, and he studied your face as if they might be written there. He'd always claimed to be bad with words, but once he found the right ones, he was like a skilled craftsman– and whether they came in large bundles or in small, staggered phrases, they were always artfully chosen, like a florist chooses the perfect flowers for a bouquet.</p><p>“I'm... yours,” he tried after a moment, shoulders sagging with a huffed sigh as he seemed to almost give up, but his tone sounded almost doubtful, tinged with longing. It surprised you that he could ever doubt what he was to you, after what you'd shared together on his roof, in the sheets of his bed. In those early hours of dawn, when he'd left you breathless and wanting as he curled around you, sharing heat and love and everything you were.</p><p>Of course. <em>Of course,</em> you wanted to say, but you were speechless for a moment, and let your expression melt like butter instead. You didn't smile, but you buried your face into his hand, pressed against it and kissed his palm, your own hand coming up to rest against the back of his, holding it against you.</p><p>“I'm <em>yours</em>,” you replied, closing your eyes against a sudden sting that sprouted up and flowered behind them, like a thorny bush of new roses.</p><p>He took in a shaky breath and held you for a moment, thumb stroking your cheek in the dark. Then he turned his hand slightly and you let it go, lowered your hand to your lap as he slid his over your skin and tilted your head up once more. You opened your eyes and took in his expression, hazy eye lights glowing hot in the shadows of his sockets as he leaned towards you. Papyrus parted his jaw and let hot breath ghost over your lips, brushed the barest of touches against them with those sharp teeth that turned soft as they met your flesh. You let your eyes close again, kissed him back and reached up to hold him.</p><p>He sighed when he pulled away, and you let a tiny bit of light peek through the clouds, a small smile quirking at your lips as he pressed his forehead against yours. Little droplets were still falling from his hood, but the water felt nice as it touched your skin and soaked through the fabric of your pajamas. It was cool and refreshing like a breeze.</p><p>You let your smile grow in the secret space under his hood, leaned in and kissed him again. It made him chuckle, quiet little “nyeh heh's” escaping him as he nuzzled your face.</p><p>Papyrus turned his head slightly after a moment, hood shifting out of the way as his purple gaze moved to watch the shadows behind the sheets like you had, and you turned to watch as well. It was still raining heavy and loud outside, but your room didn't feel as dark with him here, and the rain didn't feel so smothering.</p><p>“Can I lift it up?” he asked softly, and you glanced over, hesitated before nodding. The two of you parted, and Papyrus climbed up farther onto the bed, reached up to tuck the bottom of the sheet into the top. The light from the street lamps streamed in like they'd been waiting this whole time for the opportunity, played against the drops as they dripped down your window, and the rain pattered down hard and fast beyond that.</p><p>“S'pretty out there,” he mumbled as you watched, then kicked off his shoes and let them flop onto the floor. He crawled over to tuck himself in beside you. You curled against him and laid your face against his wet jacket, watched the glistening droplets with him. They were like little shreds of moonlight, tiny stars to make up for the cloudy blanket of a stormy sky.</p><p>“Yeah, it is,” you breathed back, as the two of you settled in. You eventually fell asleep to the sounds of sheeting rain and gently rolling thunder.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2IXI9vKQ9U">all we need is everlasting raindrops on our windows,</a><br/>to open up the dreams we left behind</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>